South Africa's lingering poverty and unemployment, along with crime, corruption, and a devastating AIDS epidemic, appear to be wearing away the sheen on its young democracy.
"Standing on the sidelines, failing to go to the polls, is a neglect of the democratic duty," Nelson Mandela, South Africa's first black president, warned at an overflowing ANC election rally.
"And in our case in South Africa, it can be read to signal disregard for the hard and painful struggles that went into bringing about democracy."
In an unusual door-to-door campaign from squalid shacks to comfortable middle-class living rooms, Mandela's successor accentuated the ANC's achievements and asked supporters to be patient.
The government has built 1.6 million houses, brought clean water to 9 million more people and now delivers electricity to 70 percent of homes. The former socialist party has revived an ailing economy and lifted the country from diplomatic isolation to take a leading role in African affairs.
Above all, the ANC has presided over a peaceful transition to majority rule hailed as a miracle.
Lunga Makoe, a 25-year-old security guard, was a child under apartheid but still remembers its horrors.
"My older brothers were shot with rubber bullets and beaten by police," he said. "This is why we must all vote. We can never live like that again."
Opponents led by the Democratic Alliance, expected to finish a distant second, accuse Mbeki and the ANC of mishandling the AIDS crisis, neglecting to crack down on corruption and crime, and failing to create jobs in the new "rainbow nation."
While a new black elite is changing the face of South African suburbs and boardrooms, life has changed little for millions still trapped in crowded townships and isolated villages.
Unemployment of more than 30 percent has hit poorly educated blacks hard, and the gap between rich and poor is increasing. An estimated 5.3 million South Africans are infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS -- more than in any other country.
" 'Rainbow nation' is a nice phrase, but there is no black or brown in a rainbow," grumbled Trevor Trout, 47, an unemployed father of four living in a cramped home in Cape Town.
More than 20 million of South Africa's 45 million people have registered to vote for a 400-member National Assembly, which will then choose a president. Nine provincial assemblies also will be elected and they, in turn, will select delegates to the 90-member National Council of Provinces, parliament's second chamber.
The main concern is that the new generation of voters is too young to remember the brutality of apartheid.
"For these kids, the political struggle is in a sense over," said Dino Fifas of the Logistix Kids research and marketing company. "Money is now where it is at."
S'bu Ndebele, a 24-year-old student, passed up his last chance to register to vote for a trip to the mall.
"You vote, you get nothing. So rather spend your money and get something," he said, holding up three designer shopping bags. "It's how the world works now."
